Angry and violent: the case of a destructive young girl

by Deborah Collins

“Anna” was twelve when she came for the
first time, along with her mother, but she had in fact been under homeopathic
treatment for a large part of her life. Her mother had even taken up the study
of homeopathy in order to help find something for her daughter, as the
situation was running completely amok. Having heard of this “demon child” for
several years from a previous homeopath, I was well-warned, and put away
anything breakable or of value in my clinic. Anna sat beside her mother,
visibly discontent at having been dragged to yet another therapist. “It’s not
me, it’s my parents. My mother is terrible, she only gives us prison food to
eat.” One would think that the girl had been beaten, starved and tormented in
every possible way, from the way she talked about her parents. And yet, her
mother must be one of the sweetest and patient women I have ever encountered,
doing all that she could do to find help for her daughter, and for the family,
which was suffering badly from the girl’s behaviour.

Everything had to be on Anna’s terms, in
her own time and in her own way, with no consideration for anyone around her.
She would for instance get something in her mind, and then “have to have it”,
otherwise she would throw a full-blown temper tantrum, no matter where she was,
complete with cursing, swearing, attacking people and smashing everything
around her. She was known to completely demolish anything in her sight – the
television, the computer, or the dinnerware. In fits of anger, she would tug
the tablecloth off the table, and the family’s meal would end up on the floor,
while the other children would scream and cry. Her mother wrote: “Every time I
disappeared into another room, she would rip up my work. She won’t listen, but
at the same time blames me for not helping. It’s like a no-win situation with
her. She has written awful stuff on my desk with a permanent marker, ripped up
all my note pads, letters, used up all my cello-tape, staples, ink on stamps,
and so on.”

She would be so insistent that her parents
often ended up giving in, even to her most expensive and excessive demands. For
years, she said that if she could only have a horse, she would be happy, and
finally, her parents bought her one. Anna ended up spending all her time with
her horse, which she much preferred to the girls of her age: “They’re all
mean!” She would make friends, then always have a fall-out with them. She was
failing badly at school, and ended up being home-schooled, but most of the time,
she simply lazed about and lay in bed, as she said that she was “too tired” to
do her schoolwork.

There was always time and energy for her
horse, though; she would spend days at a time with her horse, neglecting all
else. She insisted on having only the
best for her horse – the best food, the best stable, the best saddle, otherwise
another fit would follow. Once, when driving home with her mother after buying
horse fodder, she went into a rage on the highway, shrieking and pulling her
mother’s hair. “You have not bought the right food! It’s not good enough! You
are starving my horse!” Her mother tried to explain that the “right food” was
sold out at that moment, but that what they had bought was in fact perfectly
fine. This, however, brought on even more rage, and Anna tugged at her mother’s
hair until she nearly fainted from pain, almost losing control of the car.

Anna was extremely picky about her own
food, as well. She would not eat Indian food, although the family was of Indian
origin, and the mother was an excellent cook. She would demand certain foods,
such as ten Big Mac hamburgers, and then eat one bite and throw the rest away.
“It is as though she is simply trying to torment us all the time – nothing we
do is ever right for her, and we get blamed for her bad moods all the time.”

Meanwhile, she was gaining weight, and was
diagnosed with a thyroid condition. Her skin was greasy and pimply, and her
stools smelled putrid. Her personal hygiene was atrocious – she refused to wash
or shower, and no one dared to touch food that she had put her hands on. She
was continually scratching herself, picking her nose and her bottom, much to
the disgust of her siblings.

The relationship with her father was
especially fraught – anything that her father asked her to do ended up
escalating into fights between them. Of this she said: “If I do what he says, I
would be giving in, and then, I would have lost the battle.” If he misplaced
anything that had to do with her horse, all hell would break lose, as though he
was personally abusing her.

The family’s history was revealing. Anna’s
mother described the situation of her husband’s parents, in particular. They
had been born in India, but
had moved to Fiji
in order to better themselves financially. Once there, however, they found
themselves going from the frying pan into the fire. They were treated like
slaves – having to scrounge for even poorly paid work, and living in squalor.
The husband was maltreated by his boss and in turn, he beat his wife at home.
She had already been beaten by her own father while living in India. The
husband also beat their son, the father of Anna, who carried a deep resentment
towards his father.

Anna’s father managed to free himself from
the situation, marring a loving and caring wife, also of Indian origin, and
founding a family. He worked extremely hard, and became very successful, but
suffered from his pent-up anger.

Anna’s mother often compared her daughter
to her mother-in-law: “They are both so wilful. Nothing that anyone ever does
is right. They have the same fits of anger, and they blame everything on
someone else.”

Given Anna’s extreme attachment to her
horse, I started with Lac Equinum 200C, one dose. Her behaviour reminded
me of a horse gone mad from abuse, kicking and lashing out. After this, she
settled down immediately, getting along with her siblings much better and
getting her schoolwork done. Her mother noted that her sense of playfulness and
humour returned – she joked instead of snarling, and asked to snuggle with her
mother. Her “obsession” with her horse diminished: she no longer needed to
spend all her time with him, nor did she go into rages around his care. Some
things remained, though: she was still picky about her food and refused to
wash. She continued to clash with her father.

Her habit of demanding things she later
refused led to the next remedy, perhaps one that she needed all along: Cina,
in ascending potencies. After the first dose, she expelled a lot of threadworms
and stopped picking her nose. Gradually,
her behaviour settled even more and she considered going back to school instead
of staying at home. This posed many problems, as she easily felt bullied and
misunderstood. It was becoming easier to reason with her about the need for her
to complete her homework, though she did it with reluctance and a fear of
failure. Repeated doses over time led to a calming of the situation at home and
at school, much to everyone’s relief.

Despite this, she still refused to wash and
she still clashed with her father. The final remedy was then Ammonium
carbonicum. According to Jan Scholten, this corresponds to “resentment for
the father”, along with the well-known “uncleanliness”.

In the course of two years, Anna has gone
from a “demon child” to a friendly young woman, who has friends of her own, and
gets along well with her siblings. Her thyroid condition normalised.

In this case, the family dynamic was the
most crucial aspect of the case. One would wonder why a girl with such loving parents
would take on the behaviour she did, until one looks at the situation of her
grandmother, with whom she was so often compared. Beaten as a child, and then
later as an adult, put down, humiliated and made to live in impoverished
conditions while working hard, she carried a pent-up rage. It would seem that
this rage was transmitted to her son, who channelled it into hard work, climbing
the ladder of success. This rage, however, found its expression in Anna, who
behaved as though she herself had been beaten and tormented. One could say that
Anna carried the family pain, forcing the family to look at it and heal the
family history of abuse rather than push it away by sheer hard work.

Interestingly, as Anna began to reintegrate
into the family, her paternal grandfather became ill with heart complaints,
reminiscent of Aurum. Anna’s father was reluctant to visit him, as he was
unresolved about the relationship. I suggested Aurum carbonicum for Anna’s
father, since his wife was concerned that he was going in the same direction as
his father, and would end up with heart complaints himself. He took the remedy
and things became steadily more harmonious at home. I no longer receive panic
emails, only mails to say how well things are going (note that nearly the whole
treatment has taken place by email, after one initial in-person consultation,
since we live on opposite side of the globe).

Cina belongs to the Compositae family
(Asteraceae), along with Arnica, Bellis perennis, Calendula and other trauma
remedies. Often, the response of someone needing a remedy from the Compositae
family is to become tough and independent, fighting back and not giving in. The
Cina reaction is one of anger, and even violence, at anything that they
perceive to be an intrusion of their boundaries. Jan Scholten places Cina in
stage 13 of the Compositae, similar to Mercurius, the stage of fighting, as
though everyone is their enemy. He writes of Cina, in his new book “Wonderful
Plants”: "They cannot stand to be
interfered with or taken over. They easily feel violated, for instance by
doctors who decide over them, or by parents or teachers who overrule them. It
feels like a threat, as if they are violated and even as if they are threatened
with being killed. It is a blow to their integrity and autonomy. It makes them
very angry. They can express their anger very violently, but often they retire
into themselves, feeling grudging and bitter. They can be very snappish and
sarcastic about the world.”

Thank you for your comment. One of the reasons why I have published this case is, in fact, to address exactly the issue that you have raised here, that of multiple prescriptions in the course of a case. We are often taught that the "ideal" case is one where we have given only one perfect remedy to fit the case in its entirety - truly an elegant way of working. However, in practice, the situation is somewhat different, and it often turns out to be necessary to follow the patient accurately, as they make changes within themselves. This sometimes requires a series of remedies rather than just one, a line of thought that is followed by many modern masters of homeopathy such as Jan Scholten. One could say that we humans are "plural" rather than "singular".

Ehab
Posts: 3

Multi remediesReply #2 on : Sat September 07, 2013, 03:06:13

Thanks for this interesting artillery , I wonder as Anna has received 3 remedies during her treatment course to control different symptoms that were not covered by single remedy . This seems different from what I learnt in CCNM as I knew that it is ideal to choose one remedy only the treat all the symptoms the patients has (totality) but in this example , although looks fine and logic ; but it is different from the other opinion I just mentioned . I need your feedback . Thanks